Producer Dana Brunetti Reveals GRAN TURISMO Is Based on the Real-Life GT Academy

Racing films are all the rage at the moment, and much of that is thanks to the massive box office success of the Fast & Furious series. The seventh installment of that franchise is currently in production, and we’ve also got Need for Speed, Hot Wheels, and Gran Turismo movies on the way. The latter is in development at Sony Pictures and is based on the popular racing simulator video game. While video game adaptations are nothing new, many have been wondering just exactly how one turns Gran Turismo into a feature film. Well it turns out the plot of the movie is actually based on a real-life story involving the game.

Steve recently sat down with producer Dana Brunetti for an extended interview, and during the course of their conversation he talked about the plot of the Gran Turismo movie and how close the pic is to coming to fruition. Read on after the jump.

Speaking with Steve, Brunetti admitted that he’s aware of everyone’s confusion regarding turning Gran Turismo into a movie, but he thinks they have a solid story to tell that’s based in fact:

“A lot of people are like, ‘How the hell do you make a movie out of a video game that’s basically a driving simulator?’ And actually the story is they did an online competition where they narrowed it down 25,000 people competing online, and then got it narrowed down to 22 people that they took to Silverstone race track basically to see if it was possible to go from virtual to reality. And then they basically put them through a racing boot camp through physical, mental, and technical driving school to train and see who would be the best race car drivers out of that.

The top two they then took and put in the 24 hours at Dubai race, and they are now race car drivers… So the movie that we’re gonna do is kind of really a wish-fulfillment fantasy that this kid plays this video game and ultimately goes from this video game to actually racing the race cars.”

The GT Academy is actually a thing that exists, and the trials and competition have thus far turned four Gran Turismo enthusiasts into bona fide race car drivers. While Brunetti—whose credits include The Social Network and Captain Phillips—noted that his production company works on a lot of non-fiction films, they’ll be taking the GT story in a rather different direction:

“We do a lot of non-fiction stories [and] this is based in truth, but we’re gonna take a lot of license with it.”

Brunetti added that they are currently looking for a writer, but he thinks the project will move forward quickly because there’s a high level of interest from the studio. Watch the video interview below, and if you missed any of our other stories on Steve’s interview with Brunetti peruse the following links:

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